The present invention relates to an apparatus for treating, refreshing or cleaning fabric articles, especially articles of clothing, linen and drapery.
For the cleaning of fabric articles consumers have the choice of conventional aqueous immersive wash laundry cleaning or dry cleaning.
Conventional laundry cleaning is carried out with relatively large amounts of water, typically in a washing machine at the consumer""s home, or in a dedicated place such as a coin laundry. Although washing machines and laundry detergents have become quite sophisticated, the conventional laundry process still exposes the fabric articles to a risk of dye transfer and shrinkage. A significant portion of fabric articles used by consumers are not suitable for cleaning in such a conventional laundry process. Even fabric articles that are considered xe2x80x9cwashing machine safexe2x80x9d frequently come out of the laundry process badly wrinkled and require ironing.
Most dry cleaning processes rely on non-aqueous solvents for cleaning. By avoiding water these processes minimize the risk of shrinkage and wrinkling. The need for handling and recovering large amounts of solvents make these dry cleaning processes unsuitable for use in the consumer""s home. The need for dedicated dry cleaning operations makes this form of cleaning inconvenient and expensive for the consumer.
More recently, dry cleaning processes have been developed which make use of compressed gases, such as supercritical carbon dioxide, as a dry cleaning medium. Unfortunately these processes have many shortcomings, for example they require very high pressure equipment.
Other drycleaning processes have recently been described which make use of nonsolvents such as perfluorobutylamine. These also have multiple disadvantages, for example the nonsolvent fluid cannot adequately dissolve body soils and is extremely expensive.
Accordingly there are unmet needs for new apparatus, methods, and compositions for cleaning or treating fabric articles that are safe for a wide range of fabric articles, minimize shrinkage and wrinkling, and can be adapted to a cost effective use in the consumer""s home and/or in service businesses and commercial environments.
The needs described above are fulfilled by the present invention.
In one aspect of the present invention, a fabric treating apparatus comprising a chamber capable of receiving a fabric to be treated and a cleaning fluid comprising a lipophilic fluid, wherein when a fabric to be treated is present in the chamber and a cleaning fluid comprising a lipophilic fluid is introduced into the fabric-containing chamber, the fabric-containing chamber retains an amount of lipophilic fluid up to the absorptive capacity of the fabric contained therein, is provided.
In another aspect of the present invention, a kit of consumables, especially suitable for use with the fabric treating apparatus of the present invention, is provided.
These and other aspects, features and advantages will become apparent to those of ordinary skill in the art from a reading of the following detailed description and the appended claims. All percentages, ratios and proportions herein are by weight, unless otherwise specified. All temperatures are in degrees Celsius (xc2x0C.) unless otherwise specified. All measurements are in SI units unless otherwise specified. All documents cited are in relevant part, incorporated herein by reference.